Meeting 82-year-old Palestine Liberation Leader Mahmoud Abbas at the White House, 70-year-old President Donald Trump hit an optimistic note about the prospects for an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal. Trump rankled the mainstream press Feb. 15 when he met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, saying he could accept a one-state solution or a two-state solution, depending on what both parties want. Generations of presidents, dating back Richard Nixon, worked toward a two-state solution, where Israel would make land-for-peace concessions from its spoils of the 1967 Six Day War. Former President Jimmy Carter got Israel to return the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt in 1979 for a peace deal with Israel but go no where trying to negotiate with PLO founder Yasser Arafat. Arafat wanted more than a return to the pre-1967 borders, using Hamas’s founder Sheikh Ahmed Yassin to stay at war with Israel.
Hamas’s leader in exile 60-year-old Khalid Meshaal vowed yesterday to stop calling for Israel’s destruction but still showed no acceptance for what he calls the “Zionist entity.” Trump promised to “get it done,” referring to an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal, insisting “this was the toughest deal to make, let’s prove them wrong,” Trump said at White House press conference. Trump made clear that the U.S. “won’t insist on a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,” hoping Abbas knows that he’s going to have to give ground to get an independent state. Trump said he wants Abbas to “sign the last agreement,” finally settling the 70-year-old conflict. Abbas carries Hamas’s demands that Israel give back all of the spoils of the 1967 Six Day War, something Netanyahu says impossible. Israel returned the Gaza Strip to the PLO Sept. 1, 2005, only to watch it fall to Hamas June 13, 2007.
Abbas considers all of Israel’s spoils to the 1967 War subject to return to Palestinians for any peace deal, including East Jerusalem, all of the West Bank and formerly Syria’s Golan Heights. Israel’s security requires it maintains a buffer zone in the Golan Heights and parts of the West Bank for security. Abbas’s demand for Israel to return to the pre-1967 borders is a non-starter. When PLO founder Yasser Arafat walked away from a peace deal brokered by former President Bill Clinton in 2000, it was clear Hamas would not accept any deal unless Israel vacated all the territory seized during the Six Day War. Before the 1967 War, Palestinians held not one inch of sovereign territory, once owned by Egypt’s Gaza Strip and Sinai Peninsula, Syria’s Golan Heights and Jordan’s West Bank and East Jerusalem. Only years later did Palestinians claim all the spoils of the Six Day War.
Palestinians have been fighting a guerrilla war to reclaim the British mandate of Palestine handed to Israel in 1948. In the wake of the Holocaust, the British felt inclined to give Jews a homeland, once controlled by the Ottoman Empire for centuries before the end of WWI. Speaking at a White House press conference, Abbas put his trust in Trump, saying he was “capable, under your stewardship and great negotiating ability” to be partners with the U.S. What Abbas doesn’t get is that Trump won’t push Israel or the Palestinians to make the painful concessions needed to satisfy both parties. Abbas knows that Netanyahu won’t give him all that he wants or demands, knowing that whatever the deal it’s preferable to the armed resistance that’s left Palestinians in dire poverty. Abbas wants compensation for Palestinians refugees and to resolve prisoners warehoused in Israeli jails.
When former President George W. Bush dealt with Yasser Arafat after Sept. 11, he informed him that the U.S. won’t deal with any group that practices terrorism, even when idefined as national resistance. Trump looks to continue Bush’s Mideast doctrine that any group practicing terror—for whatever reason—will not do business with the United States. Abbas continues to pay families to suicide bombers, car-rammers or knife attackers monthly stipends for killing Israeli civilians. While telling Netanyahu recently go easy on West Bank or East Jerusalem settlement construction, Trump won’t pressure Israel like Carter and Clinton, especially when it comes to compromising Israel’s national security. Carter’s been especially critical of Israel, going so far to call the Mideast’s only democracy an “apartheid state,” proving he understands nothing of the post-Sept. 11 world.
Abbas’s age and limited power with Hamas controlling the Gaza Strip makes him a weak negotiating partner with Israel. When you consider Arafat walked away from major concessions from Israel in 2000 under Clinton, it’s doubtful Abbas will accept anything short of his demands to return to the pre-1967 War borders. Neither PLO’s Abbas nor Hamas’s Meshaal will admit that Palestinians held no sovereign land before the 1967 War. Netanyahu’s willing to cede most of the West Bank and East Jerusalem to the PLO but only if Israel retains enough buffer zone to make sense. Knowing the seamless relationship between n the U.S. and Israeli military, Trump’s in no position to compromise Israel’s national security for a peace deal. If Abbas wants a two-state solution, it’s not going to be at Israel’s expense. Trump won’t push any deal that sacrifices Israel’s security.
